Danzig Says Deaths of Bowie and Prince Inspired Misfits Reunion

After shocking Fiend Club members and music fans last week with the announcement that Glenn Danzig had returned to the Misfits to perform a pair of reunion shows, the group have now gone ahead and explained how they've buried their decades-old beef somewhere deep in a "London Dungeon."

Singer Danzig and bassist Jerry Only, both founding members of the iconic punk group, have been quite public with the reasons for the reunion. For Danzig, the recent passing of a number of music legends had him rethinking his own Legacy of Brutality with the Misfits.

"It's been a shock to see so many musicians dying this year," he told Rolling Stone. "A lot of them weren't really that old. David Bowie's death came out of the blue, as did Prince's. And I've said it before with [Type O Negative's] Peter Steele and Dio: If you're a music fan, you think these artists will be here forever, but you should enjoy them while they're here, because you never know what will happen. You've got to enjoy it and let it happen before everybody dies."

The interview with Danzig notes that there had been a lot of bad blood between himself and fellow founder Only over the years, including their 2014 court battle over merchandising rights, but that the members have had many meetings in recent months to resolve the tension.

"Without saying stuff I'm not allowed to say, it became a mediation and evolved from there," he said. "We put a lot of stuff behind us and resolved certain longstanding issues. It wasn't an overnight thing."

For now, Danzig is committed to performing with Only and his brother, guitarist Doyle Wolfgang von Frankenstein, at the Riot Fest events in Denver and Chicago this September. It's unclear at this point if the reunion will extend past this, or who will be playing drums for the Misfits, but Danzig says to expect some classics. He just won't say which ones.

"There are gonna be songs people know we're gonna do, but there's some stuff we've been talking about that people would never guess. I just want you to be surprised. I think it's better that way, especially in this whole Internet age. I hate that shit."

In a separate interview with Rolling Stone, Only said, "I wouldn't have done it unless I thought Glenn was really about it. I said, 'Look, I know every song, so you pick the songs and you pick the set. That way you got the best shot of giving your best show.' And we sat down and that happened pretty quick."

Danzig has not sang with the Misfits since the band first broke up in 1983. He went on to play with Samhain and his own eponymous metal group, while Only has maintained a rotating lineup of Misfits since getting the band back together in the mid-'90s.